I woke up thinking about all the Little Things we do…
Those inconsequential tasks or items we handle so that others around us will not have to worry. Or, those considerate things we do so as to not create a hardship on someone else. Small Things. Unimportant things, truly, but it shows how much we care for others.
We feed a stray cat. He’s not here every day, and he does not like to be touched. At all. But we do not want him to starve. So we feed him. With his temperament, we have nicknamed him Diablo. He’s drawn blood a few times. I’ve chased him away when he got too aggressive with the food I’m giving him. But he keeps coming back. He’ll disappear for days at a time, and show up with scars. We wonder who got the better end of the battle!
One of these days we’ll tame him. Maybe only enough to give him some simple loving that he so yearns to have. You can see it when he wishes for a good head-rub, but somewhere in his past the hand of human probably abused him so that he struggles with trusting anyone.
Even the hand that feeds him…For the past 3 winters…
Yesterday, the snow was piled high and Diablo was on the porch. When my bride comes home, and if he’s around, his normal duty is to escort her through the garage and into the house where he struts his stuff and shows us how thankful we should be that he gives us any attention at all! A little dry and soft food, out the front door, to his bowl, and we carefully place it in hoping he doesn’t swipe at us with his razor sharp claws. Every time we are patient, and calm, we are allowed to get closer, and closer…
With the snow, he could not easily go to the garage…so, my bride stomped him out a path from drive to porch just so he could get to her without floundering… Such a little thing. But it obviously meant a lot, because she stroked his back and got her hand back unscathed!
It’s the Little Things!
It’s the little things, foxes as Solomon says it, that spoil the vine (Song of Solomon 2:15). But it’s also the little things that make life so much better! You know, that thoughtful card you receive in the mail means more than you can ever know, and if you save them (as I do) then some day they will mean more to you because you will fondly remember that someone took the time to think of you, buy a card, write a thoughtful note, address the envelope, affix a stamp, and drop it in the mail. A lot of Little Things that Amount to something well thought out.
“It has long been an axiom of mine that the little things are infinitely the most important.” ~Arthur Conan Doyle
Many compare something they have in their little finger (joy, happiness, ability, etc.) as more than others have in their entire body! But equal in size to most little pinkies is that tongue, and we know the danger an unbridled tongue can have. Why do we allow ourselves to be on both sides of the equation, and never walking in the middle. Consistently. It’s like that little devil and angel perched on your shoulder. Little creatures, but they have big influence on the person standing between…
How can something that has the power to create joy also have the ability to slay the innocent?
But no man can tame the tongue. It is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison. With it we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the similitude of God. Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be so. (James 3:8-10 NKJV)
We hear it every day. In one breath, praise, and in the next breath slander. Somewhere between the two lives a normal voice. Be we grow to distrust it. It’s hard to draw the line between one side or the other. I hear the breath speak a praise, but the same persons written word is loud, negative and full of condemnation, foul language and thought.
It’s truly a Little Thing, perhaps, but somehow we must learn to tame the tongue (spoken, or written) and keep ourselves on a straight and narrow course.
It’s all about the little things.
We hear it from every side, every day. No side knows how to be the bigger person! Just let one side start the mudslinging, and before you can even consider what you’ve just witnessed, the other side repeats… I just remembered a quote from the Untouchables, you know, back in the early 1900’s – Al Capone, Chicago, Eliot Ness…
You wanna get Capone?
Here’s how you get him.
He pulls a knife, you pull a gun.
He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue!
That’s the Chicago way, and that’s how you get Capone!
Are they not struggling in Chicago right now? Must still be the Chicago way!
What’s the Christian Way? I think Martin Luther King said it best…
“Hate begets hate; violence begets violence; toughness begets a greater toughness. We must meet the forces of hate with the power of love…” ~Martin Luther King
It’s the Little Things, and Power of Love is such a little thing that it will win out in the end.